Can someone explain me why the fire-by-rank is gone?

[isoul]

I remember looking with such an (negative) amazement when I realized that my Line Infantry wasn't able to fire-by-rank! Can anyone explain to me what was so bad about it that it had to be removed?

Light infantry is able to have 2 or 3 ranks firing but Line Infantry can't! Isn't that, besides being inaccurate, an unbalanced feature?

They let Fire-and-advance drill (which now works better) and removed fire-by-rank so now my first line is firing while the rest are standing patiently and wait for the man in the front to be killed in order to start shooting... Seems ridiculous to me! Sorry...

I think this shouldn't be done

(I think the dev's should rethink this... there are already some mods dealing with this "problem" and I see that they are quite popular for a reason)

[Bloodzen]

I think they were removed because with a fire by rank drill you had to wait for every soldier to reload before they would fire while with the one rank fire this isn't a problem.

I actually prefer it without fire by rank anyway, the shooting seems to go more smoothly without it.

[HellFell]

fire by rank sucks. I like the current system because it feels like real battle than a stupid machine-robot engagement

[MaKoS]

Non historical. Most armies did not use, during the Napoleonic era and later, the fire by rank drill.

The standard procedure was that the first two ranks fired. The first kneeled and the second stood and fired. Sometimes the third line loaded the muskets for the other lines, though it created a lot of accidents among the troops.

Burns, poked eyes, cut ears etc!

[isoul]

fire by rank sucks. I like the current system because it feels like real battle than a stupid machine-robot engagement

Actually the real battle of that time was not like that. It had pauses between volleys, a well trained man could fire up to 3 times per minute or fire every 15sec in the case of well trained highly disciplined Prussian infantry.

Non historical. Most armies did not use, during the Napoleonic era and later, the fire by rank drill.

The standard procedure was that the first two ranks fired. The first kneeled and the second stood and fired. Sometimes the third line loaded the muskets for the other lines, though it created a lot of accidents among the troops.

Burns, poked eyes, cut ears etc!

Agree with that! But having only the first line firing is ultra-unrealistic for that period.

[aletoledo]

Why a developer did something can really only be answered by the developer. My understanding though is that it was not historical. Historically only the front 2 rows ever fired. There was never really a kneeling drill, like you have seen with fire by rank. Yes they did it occasionally, but reloading was trained to be done while standing up (muskets are long).

Whats odd though, is that the second row typically did fire between the men of the first row, which didn't get modeled. Historically there were attempts to get the third row to fire, but any benefit was lost to the awkwardness of it. It's a big reason why the British adopted a 2 row system. Other nations that kept the third row simply used them to fill in the gaps of the first two rows.

The nice thing about NTW is that if a man in the first row is killed, the guy behind him in the second immediately starts firing. So in some ways the second row does fire, just that he needs the space freed up first.

[Player2]

i could go either way tbh fire by rank inflicted kills but i agree i feels a bit clunky so either way is good for me

[gord96]

there is several mods now that will add 2-rank fire to the game.

[Marshy]

I know fire by rank is unhistorical to the period but, that doesn't mean it is not ok to CA... We all know CA doesn't know it history like it should. So whats the problem? I prefer fire by rank, makes battles more interesting...

[Lothar135]

...
The standard procedure was that the first two ranks fired. The first kneeled and the second stood and fired.
...

It would be nice to have this drill in the game.... lol, you can even see it in the trailer video when Napoleon talks about russia...they should have implemented it and dont wait for some modder to do their work!

[gord96]

just grab a mod and have 2 rank fire.!

[www2]

It would be nice to have this drill in the game.... lol, you can even see it in the trailer video when Napoleon talks about russia...they should have implemented it and dont wait for some modder to do their work!

There is allready a mod out with this feature

[Jihada]

I've modded mine to use fire by rank,see the released mods forum.It looks better and although perhaps not exactly historical it seems better than fire and advance,which the AI can't use properly anyway.

[Jarus]

Doesn't using mods make it impossible to do drop-in battles, though?

[GTFO. Jamie]

Doesn't using mods make it impossible to do drop-in battles, though?

alot of them are multiplayer compatible...

Especially the weapon sounds/music and effects ones which make the game 100% better in my opinion!

[Wally]

Maybe have fire by rank button when you want to use it.

[isoul]

Maybe have fire by rank button when you want to use it.

... or just make the 2-rank fire instead of waiting people cry out for it and a modder do it!

[Randall Turner]

There is allready a mod out with this feature

Did they balance it? Are you guys asking for the two-rank fire aesthetic, or are you asking for line infantry fire to be 2x as effective? If the latter, it's a huge balance change.

[hitokiri2486]

... or just make the 2-rank fire instead of waiting people cry out for it and a modder do it!

There's at least five mods out that do this...

And whoever said they saw men in two ranks, with the first rank kneeling and both ranks firing, in a trailer...that's because you were looking at a square formation!

[Jarus]

alot of them are multiplayer compatible...

Does this apply to gameplay-affecting mods, like the 2-rank Fire mod? Is the mod downloaded/applied to the joining player or something?